hello and welcome to cross talk where all things considered i'm peter lavelle the nato military alliance is a relic from the cold war back then it was relevant and even necessary today it is an alliance in search of a mission that search has almost completely entailed eastern expansion towards russia but a lingering question remains is the average american and western european interested in a war over the sovereignty of dystonia and montenegro. cross talking the atlantic alliance i'm joined by my guest luke prevail in brussels he's an independent journalist in paris we have emmanuelle gave she is a french lawyer and in oxford we cross to mark ohman he is the director of the crisis research institute or across the uk rules in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want and i always appreciate it let's go to our guest in paris the many well you have president mccrone just recently said that nato is brain dead how

do you reflect upon that because a nato summit is coming up next week and it's been shortened to 2 days because a lot of people worried that. donald trump will start some kind of dumpster fire as he tends to do when it comes to nato so how is the nato alliance stand right now because you have jeremy corbyn and going into election mode doubting the alliance the necessity here so i mean is mccrone right is nato brain dead go ahead. well to be honest i am afraid that this time i find myself on the same page as mr my core which is something it's something unusual for me and stopped going for me right time twice a day it's but what we have to look at is that mr mccloy saying it is a brand this is true but why because what he wants in bottom line is to make an alliance with germany and to sell our french army to the german that

has been agenda since the beginning their big idea is to think europe and to kind of congregate everyone in this type of imperial europe they have as an idea a kind of napoleon type of and. and this is a very big challenge for us french because that would mean obviously losing our army losing our sovereignty so he is using this nato this nato thing which is right to have he has a head an agenda if i could say which is to bind our army with the german army and this is something us the french have to look after because losing our army means losing our sovereignty means losing our identity so i think we're probably going to come back in the 2nd part on what is the real combat today it's not communism anymore we'll know what the civilization issue is and obviously nato is not the one

up for it so that's my point of view on that i would say with a lot of market in oxford but i would make the argument that all 27 from united states being the 28 member of nato their sovereignty is compromised as well and if you look at public opinion polls it's been pretty. trending. more and more people in western europe in the united states have doubts about you know having a collective security treaty organization for a countries that are so far away. and then what you know what's france in the u.k. in the united states want to get into a military conflict over you know a country like. a stone ian i mean is that something people are interested in to poll say people aren't go ahead mark or i think this is always the problem with a large alliance that you find that the fringe areas the border areas are remote from centers of population centers of contribution by the british the french and so

on so it's true not just for eastern europe but also for the south if we think about france italy and spain in nato the the immediate security threat comes from islamic terrorist groups operating in north africa and perhaps potentially threatening them a long way away we've heard mention of the potomac complex we have to remember that moscow is much further from the western border of russia and $812.00 than it is today and one of president macros controversial ideas from the point of view of the standard nato for is of course he's talking about reassessing the relations with russia because he doesn't feel as president of france that russia poses a threat to firms ok well let's go to lou came in in brussels i mean you know it i'm sure you've all been following this ridiculous circus called the impeachment process in the united states and you know i watched some of the hearings i didn't know that ukraine was a national security interest of the united states that's news to me and oh my goodness it's not part of nato there are no obligations to protect ukraine's

sovereignty but you would know that from the mainstream media go ahead look. ok well the collapse of ukraine it's of course started it all of course and the sanctions that were imposed both way both ways made it worse and gave nato. a reason to have aggressive language to with russia i think what happens now in the wake up call given by michael is for once excellent in the sense that by accepting to discuss with russia to discuss a memorandum on intermediate missiles so nuclear missiles. will probably gain points in europe everywhere and he will probably come to a result because this is early 001 proposal of common european defense failed like most of his proposals actually over the last few years they failed miserably and so this one marks exceed one he said that nato was brain dead he had

no no substance in the speech really about this but president putin gave him substance that by proposing to discuss by by hand by giving a hand to nato nato had said no we're not interested we can believe in it you can believe in it why don't you discuss it 1st so that's probably what michael is saying this week to worm to the nato general secretary against stoltenberg who's in paris for that precisely so nato would probably changes the scores it's speech about. the russia and about the threats that russia could represent ok many many you know that's an interesting point but i mean without you know the russian bogeyman then there's even more doubts about what nato is purposes because the in my mind nato is primary mission is to exist

ok that's what they want they have 5000 bureaucrats working for nato in brussels. so existence is the mission ok but that's a dangerous mission because of what something that mark said earlier is that we have a large alliance like this with divergent views and interests and the accident can happen and and there's some people that want that to happen here go ahead the menu and paris. yes i think that's a very good question obviously it's like taxes once they are voted it's very rare that you come back on it so nato has its own existence it's a kind of artifact in itself it stays because it is and this is always a problem we have when we create a monster you we you have walking dead frankenstein and this is what we have today but i think president trump addressed this question 2 days ago and said well i think if we had to reassign maybe a mission to nato it would be today to deal with the enemies or of our civilization and who are the enemies nowadays it's not communism anymore it's something far more

real and it is something that is that isn't really a war per se we're not going to build trenches we're not going to silo my cells we have we have a civilization war so is nato adapted to that type of war is the question and the 2nd we we question we have us french as you probably have seen in the recent news we lost 13 men in mali yeah 3 days ago in an operation that promptly was. bumping into each other the sunda what we don't know so do we have the means of saying no to nato also if we don't put more money into our defense french i'm saying because every year the defense budget is going down and so you know there's a saying in no way i think it's an done mark if you don't have an army you have the army of the country next door you know well we don't have an army anymore in france

so who's the country next door. you know you know market the. trump is already been mentioned here and again you know i'm agreeing with trump on the same program i think everybody is on this one which is a landmark in itself on this program but you know he's complained about the lack of defense spending by european allies and i mean some people can say take a count. or intuitive way of looking at him saying you know make it so exorbitant that they say they don't want to pay for it ok and that will give a reason for trying to say ok if i will go home if you don't want to pay for your own security if you're so afraid of russia why don't you pay for it i mean that's a very good argument ok and of course the europeans are not going to go along with it but i hope to get back to that dr go ahead mark in oxford. here but he also we have to remember that the europeans are primary focused on their immediate vicinity even if they dispute which is the direction of threat or concern but the americans are global and one of the things i think we shouldn't perhaps obsess too much about

is trump personally because i think quite often we overlook that the american security establishment shows trumps dissatisfaction with the europeans poly because it wants to spend more money in asia its primary concern is the growth of chinese power and whole issues to do in east asia so they want the europeans to provide more self-sufficiency so that america will still be the lead power in nato but it will be having to develop came in recent years that maher think that's a very that's a very good point here and i think that that would erode if i was a european i would be very irritated by it so you want us to pay more money but you're still in charge how does that work ok i can see the in the idea about that keep going mark. no i think this is where we see tensions both between washington and its allies in europe but also within europe because we can see that the if you like the 3 big players in your britain france and germany are all moving in slightly different directions mrs merkel after all was the 1st to criticize trump

when he became president and say that perhaps germany in the europeans would have to do more for their defense and then the german suddenly thought we have to pay for it we don't want to and we as a culture germany has been transformed the british are moving closer to the united states leaving european union and so from speak comes the central player but as we've heard from a menu of the problem is that france wants to play a role that it can't really afford to pay for. so actually all of this discussion reveals really how fragile the nato situation is and at the same time it's sort of bureaucracy continues to plow forwards ignoring the fact that public opinion domestic politics in the member states is beginning to drift more and more away from it. ok i'm going to jump in here we're going to go to a short break and after that short break we'll continue our discussion on the atlantic alliance step with our.

always still got us into times have a duty to clean sneak. we're going to call you to describe what i know you. can do because we're going to talk about getting out of your convention each of them to look at them as all. you didn't have them do eat too much haha get to be a good tone could fall under your thumb to get those people to feel when i'm in the good children to one with all that you can tie when the family don't come fall will do more good in your.

join me every 1st week on the alex i'm unsure when i'll be speaking to guest of the world of politics sports business i'm show business i'll see you then. young elephants have come to us after. us basically brutal putting incidents because sadly the baby elephants often do see their mothers be killed but also be caught up and voted. i do believe they laugh and smile i see it in these little ones a home station expression changes. in the.

in this community there are people who believe that it's ok. it's really hard there are no jobs and you see that i've got kids that ask and as a parent. i can come up with lots of arguments and there's a lot of conflict within the game and between the 2 teams most of the conflicts i would say throw balls around money there most of them money is made. close one on the children's cosimo each other is good business the state of california alone makes $6000000000.00 a year off to prison complexes to get some 20 alive where. you don't care anymore nobody cares about your so your care might anything. welcome back across the uk where all things considered i'm peter lavelle to remind

you we're discussing the atlantic alliance. ok let's go back to luke in brussels i want to reflect upon something that emanuel was talking about these outer area operations under the. the banner of the flag of nato here it seems to me that that's also. europe is being used as like an aircraft carrier as it were a base for american objectives going into africa i mean you know if you look back you know the chinese for whatever you think of them they are building a huge amount of in infrastructure in africa the united states is putting in more and more military bases ok and again this is this kind of. effect the nato in search of a mission you know what let's go to outer area right now let's go to afghanistan and see how that worked out ok i mean nato is constantly looking for something to

do to justify itself and at the same time it will not answer overtures for i'm russia and i. give you my opinion even if they did now i wouldn't trust them ok then with the eastern expansion all the way to russia's border and now this nonsense going on in ukraine this is not a partner you can trust because their motives are very very unclear go ahead look. well totally agree with you in the sense that. europe doesn't pay for its defense so don't trump is right about that and has all the priorities then europe understandable to the the warsaw pact to be it is this appeared in the ninety's i mean why still keep nato so of course hold the military in the national armies composing nato in europe there are salivating at the idea of the shopping list that they're going to give to in germany for example to a k k 2 on the minister of defense new minister of defense germany is accepted

again in poland and presence of the of my can pay off for example that is accepted again to pay 2 percent and it will be in a few years that they have reached out level so there will be a huge improvement of european defense potentially wherever it is as you say africa is very important for the moment i mean the french are fighting nearly alone there in mali for the moment with some help but the trickle from the u.k. from belgium from all the armies so the hope is that if europe wants to improve its defense it will not be by looking at russia as an enemy and the letter sent by president putin could well change the face of the world order in the coming years because nato now under pressure by my craw and it's good of him to do that will have to think again about its purpose and about what it does it's much more important to look at the southern front tier of europe and the problems that are

created by immigration and by thinks of the kind and so the french need help in mali we don't have logistics enough in the european armies even the french or the british that fulfill the 2 percent requested by by the americans so we need to make a big improvement and then only can we speak about european defense so michael had a point that's not even. so much going on france i contacted to any piece today and they said that they are of course curious that book will happen but that they agree with the president just like ok let's go back to paris to many well i mean the poles have talked about creating. trump the poles i lived there for many years even under communism they're one of the most pro-american countries in europe but you know showing that you know being pro-american actually has a price tag to it and it's something that i would have liked in that we had to say i mean building up european defense against what ok what do you need all these

planes and tanks for is it to defend the no boundaries in the sovereignty of these countries are they or is it just to make them spend money so these arms companies get all of these contracts i mean it seems to me that again they're. creating monsters to slay that don't exist in their real monsters out there that you're dismissing like the southern tier of ditto with immigration in the mediterranean you have islamic charism it seems to me nato is a blunt object and it just expensive go ahead emmanuel. i think you are right on this point. the fish and machine they are creating their own needs and bottom line is when you speak to persons in the army they are saying that their most of the time their planes are in really bad condition when you are in mali for example that the sand was a big problem i was talking to a european m.p.

2 weeks before the event in mali and he said to me we are going to have big problems there because our men are just trying to stay alive they knew that and 2 weeks after we see that so i found there is a dick called to me between what nato asks for and what we really have to work with what the layman what down to earth men have to do when they are on missions. they have to work with the equipment they have i don't know where all the money spent on nato goes but i know it's not on our guys because they have to do with very little of it and. you know it's saying they are tigers led by donkeys really if you think about your question i think that i think we did i think will change the title of the program just to that i think that there mark if you again public opinion polls that the majority of germans would like to see american troops go home ok i mean that's and that's not reported widely in the mainstream media of

course i read antiwar dot com and they made a big deal about it but the average american has no idea that they're not wanted in germany anymore there's a lot of troops in germany and that's as for operations the united states is running in the middle east ok again using europe as a conduit a many well brings up a very very good point is that you know these militaries are not high tech there's not a lot of money put into it there it's not high prestige as far as i understand but it's for washington it's an important public figure leaf you know that they have this big expensive shiny alliance but it's more for ego than anything else not for a purpose ok look what happened in afghanistan all right and again you have all of these armies and we don't fight in the snow we don't fight in the rain we don't fight it dark i mean these are all fig leaves ok the united states wants to say this is the international community well it's not the international community it's washington and its allies and europe that's all it is it's

a huge fig leaf and it's a fraud go ahead mark well certainly it's obviously true for american public opinion it is good to be able to say look we have all these are we have the mother of all taking part but coming back to a point you're making earlier about poland and you know we've both been of a generation that remember these places in the cold war 'd and yet i did europe the huge change it seems to me is that when you have a crisis for instance over the issue of the cruise missiles and. and in the 1980 s. when push came to shove the german public the british public the french public all voted for candidates who supported american policy today we find even amongst quite conservative people there's an alienation from trump and in a sense ironically the mainstream media's relentless parents against trump has actually damaged the links between the americans and their european allies because most people so trumps the american president they don't think of him as a person and the other side of this course is that when one was 1st in soviet bloc in the 1000 seventy's eighty's you never came across anti western opinion even

members the communist party were not anti western whereas now in particular we see in russia but in some other countries to the disillusionment with the west since the collapse of communism since the failures of the economic advice that went badly wrong means that we actually now have a popular base for anti western policies in some countries which didn't exist when you had a monopoly of communist propaganda but people didn't believe it now in some ways you have a kind of popular underpinning of this so we have 2 things we have. o.d.u. dissolution with its links with the americans which is growing as you say particularly germany and also the rivalry with russia has a popular base city didn't really have in the time of creation or from nixon or even reagan and gorbachev. that's a very good point because i can tell you living i've been living in moscow for over 20 years and this this illusion meant with the west is very very real because words and actions are very different they see the the hypocrisy all of the time and

a lot of russians that i that i know that have known for a very long time don't understand why they have to be deemed as an enemy when they repeatedly reach out to try to have a european house again i go back to we can go back to got a bunch of president putin when he came to power in 2000 said the same thing when president made their voice president he said the same thing but the answer is always. no or you can join the club but you have to sit at the children's table that's the deal go ahead look well i agree with you fully we can all nato is updated and we don't need tanks because we're not going to fight a tank battles like the battle in the past the. in the in the plains of poland this is ludicrous so the european defense must adapt to the threats which comes from the south as i said from africa france cannot be alone there for city and we should help more there are other issues with iran with pakistan and that have the

bomb bore or could have it soon so i understand what europeans need their defense organized better it's probably not for the nato i agree in the sense that america wants to go they don't want to be the umbrella protecting europe anymore the cold war is finished and so they have other issues in the far east so they want to get the military back in and free for other missions so europe must think about its own defense so i see it in 2 steps 1st nato must refocus and thanks to my core it seems it is possible or thanks to putin in a sense but one it is refocused will be on different missions to the sounds and it put it to the south it won't be nato anymore it would be a european defense force ok and as it should be emmanuelle before we were almost out of time should turkey stay in the need to allow an alliance i mean they always talk about nato values turkey in line with that real quick one minute of the thing is that if we're going to make a if if we have if we have decided that nato is outdated and we want something more

of a european defense we don't want turkey principle in turkey in our in i mean i don't personally so that's that well i want a i mean there's a lot you know that's very short but you know that that's what i think it's really important to mention that in this kind of conversation because we talk about values having shared values here. and we've seen since the the attempted coup in 2016 with all of these purges of the military and then you have going on turkey going into syria as a nato member again that's a trip wire that we all have to be careful of why would we want to fight a war against syria because of turkey it's food for thought there that's all the time we have many thanks to my guests in brussels paris and oxford and thanks to our viewers for watching us here at r.t.c. next time remember.

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3 people are injured in the netherlands in a stabbing attack the suspect is currently on the loose. in the. capital 2 people have been stabbed to death as orthotics investigates an incident they say is a terrorist attack. with a live in the grip of political instability we speak to a local man who was brutally beaten and publicly humiliated by rivals of ousted president. also kind of my here. but they can't change me and i want people to. believe them people cannot live like this.